


You're a Deathless Soul

by Besagew



Category: Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Comfort Food, Cunnilingus, Dirty Talk, Emotional Sex, Erotic Wrestling, Explicit Sexual Content, F/M, First Time, Force Bond (Star Wars), Hurt/Comfort, Inappropriate Use of the Force, Mutual Pining, Mystical Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, Oral Sex, Protectiveness, Redeemed Ben Solo, Resistance Member Ben Solo, Sparring, Vaginal Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-05
Updated: 2018-11-05
Packaged: 2019-08-19 09:14:42
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,248
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16531700
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Besagew/pseuds/Besagew
Summary: Redeemed Ben and Rey spar in an empty training room on base. Rey has been attempting to seduce Ben for months, but he pretends to be oblivious because he thinks he isn’t good enough for her and will ruin her. She teases him too much during their sparring session and ben finally snaps. He pins her down and eventually fucks her into the ground while whispering how much of a slut she is for him in her ear. Rey loves it.(fill forthis requeston reylohardkinks. Title is taken again froma Rumi poem.)





	You're a Deathless Soul

**Author's Note:**

> This is a fill for the above prompt, but it kind of got away from me... but oh well. I’m playing fast and loose with how Force Telepathy/Empathy works because the idea of having an empath/telepath boyfriend is the sexiest fictional thing in the entire universe. This is also inspired by [my favorite Reylo fanvid of all time](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y_GE7Gfv86M).

Rey woke up but wished she hadn't.

Pain. 

Full-body pain shot through her like a runaway happabore had hit her. Even hissing out a breath hurt. She wanted to go back to sleep, so she wouldn't have to feel.

Beyond the pain, she knew if she opened her eyes, there might be worse than pain. 

Were they alive? She didn't know. Sometimes it was better not to know. Not yet, she couldn't face it yet. Just let her sleep….

“Rey,” Ben choked.

Rey's heart seized at the sound of his voice.

He was still alive. She opened her eyes and he was there beside her bed, safe and with her.

The last thing she remembered was desperation, and pain like ice in her stomach, a pain worse than any she'd ever felt before. The handle of a diagger protruded there, held in the gloved hand of the First Order general. Hux. 

Hux had stabbed her. Hux had been aiming for Ben, but she had blocked his strike with her own body. She could remember the cold man's vicious frustration, and Ben catching her, and regret at his anguished face, regret that she never told him… and then darkness.

For a moment, Rey thought she might be paralyzed. When she tried to sit up, her muscles wouldn't listen to her. Then her fingers and toes twitched, but that was all. At least they were moving.

Somehow, she still felt calm. How could she be worried as long as she could look at him? There were dark smudges under his serious eyes and his lips were pressed together. He looked like he was falling apart. He was so handsome.

She wanted her sore body to reach for him, to finally kiss him, finally let herself have what she wanted. They should be together. She'd been dreaming of it for months, that pull between them constant and comforting. She hadn't wanted to ruin it or change it.

Everything felt hazy. 

“Ben,” she sighed happily. 

“You're awake,” he said. His eyes were so full of emotion, she thought she could see everything in them.

Terror rose in her throat. “Is Finn—?”

Ben's eyes shuttered at once. “Finn is alive. I don't know who else. I've been here.”

Relief flooded her. She realized they were in the captain's quarters of the Falcon, and she was in the pilot's bed.

“What were you thinking, Rey?” Ben said, sonorous voice shaking.

Rey blinked, finally recognizing his tension. His whole body was quivering. “What?”

“You nearly died for no good reason.”

“I saved you,” Rey said.

“For no good reason,” he insisted.

Tears filled her eyes without permission. There was too much body pain for her to handle his emotions or being lectured.

“It hurts,” she said, only a little pathetically.

His brows were still drawn, but concern softened his mouth. “You were stabbed.” His voice broke on the last word, and he paused to swallow. Then continued, haggardly. “I healed the damage, but your mind needs to catch up. Lean into the pain.”

All instincts and a lifetime of practice told her to escape it instead, to set it aside, to fall into dark sleep. But she turned to the pain instead, mapping out exactly how it felt, embracing it. It was a Force technique that she had developed together with Ben in the past few months.

The dark side and the light, working together as one, accepting the pain to give it less power. She had learned with him and taught him in the months they spent together after he'd defected. Rey had hoarded those precious hours with him and even made up flimsy excuses to make them last longer.

Ben's excuses to see her had seemed flimsy, too. How many times a day did the old Jedi practice group meditation? Probably not six.

As she thoroughly felt her pain, she peeked at Ben through her eyelashes and planned her next move.

How did you make someone your lover? You didn't just ask for it, did you?

Maybe it was a bargain to haggle over, like trading on Jakku.

_ I'll trade you this amplifier intake for a kiss. It's a good trade, Ben. I'd always give you a fair deal. _

Maybe they didn't do that. But she didn't have many examples to sift through from her life.

Rey felt her pain and stared at his lips. She couldn't move her weak limbs, but he could move for the both of them.

Ben ignored her staring. Or maybe he didn't catch it in the first place, falling into his own meditation. When Rey, blushing, dared to send him a mental idea of the two of them kissing, she found an enormous mental wall between their minds, like a slap in the face.

He'd shut her out.

“Why are you blocked off from me?” Rey asked, feeling panic rising somewhere far away.

He didn't open his eyes. “Because I want to be.”

“Open up!” Rey said, distraught.

“I'm very angry at you,” he said calmly.

He was getting better at voicing what he'd always bottled up inside. Since she could feel his emotions, it was pointless to hide them from her, and from himself, and so he usually confronted his emotions the same way they did their pain. And sometimes he would even talk about them.

But this was still bewildering, in the way that his anger often was bewildering to her. “Why? I saved your life. I thought….”

His face pinched, and she could suddenly tell how great his anger was even without feeling his emotions as a second skin. Even blocked off from him, she knew he was livid.

Was he that angry at being saved? Was he embarrassed to be the one who had needed help? She thought he enjoyed that they helped each other. That he saved her, and she saved him.

“You saving me is why I'm angry,” he said.

“Did you want to die?”

He shook his head. “No.”

With relief, she realized she believed him. “Then… did you want someone besides me to save you?”

“No.”

“Ben, you're not making sense,” Rey informed him, feeling far past the end of her rope.

“Rey, make me a promise,” Ben said suddenly, loudly, like he couldn't stand to go one more minute without saying it.

Was this something like the promises lovers made to each other?

“Anything,” she breathed.

His eyes were steady and deep. “Promise to never save my life again.”

She couldn't believe him. She really couldn't.

“I'll save your life whenever I want to,” Rey snapped. “I'll save it before breakfast every damn day!”

Ben's back stiffened. “I see.”

“Ben,” Rey said, frustrated. What did she have to say to make him understand that his life was hers, that it was precious to her? She thought he knew.

She stretched out her hand to him.

He pretended not to see it. “Things will be different now,” he told her. “You need to get your strength back.”

She drew her hand back, stung. 

It had been a mistake to leave his mind to work alone while she was unconscious. He always leaped to wrong conclusions. And with him cut off from her, she couldn't see what was wrong so she could set it right. Did something happen that she couldn't remember?

“I don't understand,” she said. “Explain it to me.”

Ben shook his head and rose from his seat.

“Don't leave me alone,” she said, the words spilling out of her.

His fists were clenched with that strange anger. But he turned back to her at once, pulled his chair closer to her bed and sat again.

“Hold my hand,” Rey said, desperate.

After a long moment, he clasped her hand in both of his and she finally felt his warmth, his hands holding her safe. 

_ Please, _ Rey thought to him.  _ I love you. _

__

But the stone wall in his mind was still there. He only held her hand as delicately as an egg, and he studied her blankets, mouth pressed together.

__

 

__

—

__

 

__

She must have slept then. 

__

When she came back to consciousness, Ben was collapsed, still sitting in his chair but with his head and shoulders pillowed on her bed. Her hand was cradled in both of his near his face. His breath fanned out over her fingers in soft warm puffs.

__

Rey could move her legs now, and she stretched them with satisfaction. Carefully, she extricated her hand and touched his hair. It was thick and soft and satisfying. Just like she knew it would be. His scalp was warm when she ran her fingers through his hair. 

__

He was so deeply asleep that he didn't even twitch, only a single troubled line appearing between his brows. Rey looked at his shoulders and hands and his sweet face and would have given a lot for him to join her on the bed, to feel him hold her.

__

He was vulnerable and soft in sleep, like anyone else. She wouldn't let anything happen to him. Not ever.

__

But that couldn't be comfortable. Even she would be stiff, and she was used to sleeping on bare metal. Rey scooted over on the bed, making room. It was more than big enough.

__

"Ben," she said.

__

He jerked awake violently, sitting up at once. He seemed too exhausted to be coherent, staring at her without seeing.

__

"Ben, come lay down," she urged.

__

Dazed, he obeyed her automatically, curling on his side facing her, eyes already closed and exhaling deeply. He was still in his singed black clothes and his boots were on.

__

She carded his hair through her fingers for as long as she could until a wave of exhaustion pulled her back to sleep.

__

 

__

—

__

 

__

She slept for hours again. When a delicious smell woke her, Ben was sitting back in the chair, grim and stiff, but looking well-rested at least. He had changed out of his clothes from the battle, and his hair looked washed.

__

“Can you move?” Ben asked.

__

She stretched experimentally and smiled, sitting up in bed. “More than I could before.”

__

A trace of an approving expression crossed his face. “Good. Are you hungry?”

__

She nodded. “Starving.”

__

A few paces away from the bed was the small kitchen that Han Solo had installed as a wedding present to his young bride. Rey had always wondered about that domestic modification while the ship rotted on Jakku, and Chewie had told her about it years later before he died.

__

From her position, she could see Ben was already making food—not rations, but the real kind of cooking, from fresh ingredients and using real heat. His shoulders and arms moved with practiced motions as he worked. His hands were so big.

__

“Are you still angry?” she asked his back.

__

He paused. “Yes,” he said quietly.

__

Rey's heart expanded painfully. “Can I fix it?”

__

“Maybe.” He loaded food on a tray. “It depends on a few things.”

__

“Like what?”

__

Ben placed the tray over her lap. There was a large steaming bowl of soup, thick and rich with spices and protein. On the side was sliced fruit she didn't recognize, faceted purple jewels with horns on the peel. 

__

There was bread too. And it wasn't instant polystarch, but an entire small loaf baked from ground flour just for her. When she touched it, it was still warm from the oven.

__

It smelled so good.

__

“The first is if you can manage to eat all of this,” Ben said.

__

“If? You think this is a challenge?”

__

“We'll see,” he said, in a transparent goading voice. He retrieved a bowl of soup for himself, balancing sliced bread on the side.

__

When she cracked open her bread and steam escaped, she almost cried with happiness. When she dipped it in the soup and ate a piece, she genuinely started sniffling.

__

“It's really good. Did you make all of this?” she said through a bite.

__

Ben looked up from his own bowl, his ears and neck turning red. “It's pretty plain. I cooked for myself for years. I've never cooked for anyone else before.”

__

“No one has ever made food for me before,” Rey said honestly.

__

His eyes narrowed with old indignation on her behalf. He still felt nothing but contempt for her parents, and something about that made her heart race. 

__

She'd nearly starved, working so hard just to eat. And then she ate what the Resistance ate, communal meals and the same sort of rations she'd always eaten. Food she'd earned with the work of her body.

__

Ben made this food with his own hands for her. He didn't ask for anything in return—not credits, not parts, not indentured servitude. He wanted her to be well. He stayed with her and protected her while she was injured and vulnerable, hiding her away from everything in this sheltered nook.

__

Rey's soul rang a single clear note like a bell.

__

_ Kiss me,  _ she thought at him heedlessly, secure in knowing his mind was still blocked off from her.  _ Press me down on the bed and kiss me, Ben. I want to taste you next. I'm sure you taste even better. _

__

Ben obliviously continued to eat, his blush from her compliment still coloring his ears. He cleared his throat sharply. “Two other things. If you still want to fix it so I can get over this.”

__

Rey raised her eyebrows, chewing.

__

“I need you to become as strong as you were before.”

__

Rey nodded, confused. “And?”

__

All the hard-earned ease in his face hardened at once, and he repeated, “Promise to never save my life like that again.”

__

“This again? Why?” she burst out.

__

“You need to be safe,” came his clipped response.

__

“No,” Rey said. “I'm not going to promise that. I would put my life on the line for my friends, let alone the one that I—” 

__

And now it was Rey's turn to blush, the unspoken word hovering between them. She wanted to say it to him, but not like this. Not when he was acting so strange.

__

“I mean, it's not fair. What if I tried to make  _ you _ promise not to save  _ my _ life?” Rey asked instead, trying to cover up the pause. 

__

Ben looked at her, considering, and shook his head. “I wouldn't be able to.”

__

“Then you're asking me to do something you can't.”

__

Ben shook his head again, obstinate. “I know you can. I know what you're capable of. You can do so many things that I can't.”

__

The bell in her heart rang again. “This isn't one of them.”

__

“I see.” He clenched his jaw and scraped the bottom of his bowl viciously with his spoon. “Then I have no choice.”

__

Rey frowned. 

__

“Right now, we're floating in space with the engines shut off,” he continued suddenly, sounding bitter. “And you should know, we'll only move again if you pilot us.”

__

Rey quirked an eyebrow. “Is that just a way to get me to start walking?”

__

“I'll die of hunger if you don't manage it soon,” he said in that strange, brittle voice. “I now know how much that motivates you.”

__

“You hardly look like you're wasting away,” she said, eyeing over his broad body.

__

He blinked at her, his bowl and whatever he was ruminating over forgotten for the moment. 

__

“But don't worry,” Rey continued. “I'll save you before you starve. I like you like this.”

__

As she spoke, his gaze became heated, locked on hers like a dangerous animal. Rey didn't make it easy on him, staring boldly at his body as she finished her meal. She looked leisurely from his shoulders and arms, chest and thighs, darting up every so often to meet his dark eyes. Daring him to do something about it.

__

He wasn't eating anymore. She could swear he wanted to kiss her, that her looking at his body charged something in him, an answer to the question her eyes asked. But he still didn't move a muscle.

__

_ I wonder how your hands would feel on me, _ she thought at his mental wall.  _ You've made me food with your hands, I think you'd be good at other things. I wish you'd stroke me down between my legs. _

__

Just as she thought he would give in to her, he turned his face away. His breath was coming faster than normal, and his hand trembled, holding his spoon. Rey blinked - he was  _ bending _ the spoon with how hard he was holding it.

__

_ Interesting, _ she thought. It seemed like the right track. Maybe she didn't need to trade anything to tempt him as a mated partner. 

__

She finished every morsel he gave her and twice as much again, tenderness and home in each bite.

__

He cleared the dishes, and though she finished her food, he never let down that wall that hid him from her mind. And the following nights when he slept, he slept in another part of the ship. 

__

—

__

She'd never been badly hurt before, and she never had anyone take care of her before. 

__

It took some getting used to. Used to being self-sufficient despite limitations and aches and pains, it was odd to trust someone to take care of her. It made her irritated sometimes, having Ben ask about how she felt. It was weird to put herself in his hands and let him do things for her.

__

But at the same time, she felt taken care of in a way she'd dreamed about but didn't know existed. She wouldn't say no to his attention being directed only at her. This is what she had secretly, desperately wanted all those years, and though it made her a little uncomfortable, she opened to the care like a flower. No matter how cloying or strange it was, she never wanted his attention to stop, not even after she recovered.

__

Eating was the strangest part. She watched him cook for her, his arms methodically kneading bread for her like she was worth the effort. The idea of being flat on her back while another person worked for her food made her feel vulnerable but cherished.

__

On the second day, she tried something she'd once overheard. It had sounded ridiculous to her at the time, but it didn't feel that way when she licked her spoon, staring at him, mainly because it seemed to work the way the Resistance officer had bragged. 

__

Ben was frozen again, his eyes tracking her movement with a laser intensity. “What are you doing?” he asked, voice deeper than she'd ever heard it.

__

“I'm just so hungry, Ben,” she answered innocently.

__

Ben's eyes narrowed.

__

Rey hummed around the spoon, eyes closing. It wasn't what she wanted, but the way he was looking at her, it was close.

__

“Would you give me something to eat, Ben?” Rey asked him.

__

Ben was speechless at her performance, just looking at her mouth. Then he exhaled in a rush, looking at the wall. “It's not ready yet,” he said. “Wait a while.”

__

Rey shrank back in on herself just a little more, wincing, and tried to brush off how bruised her ego felt.

__

She went so many years going it alone and trusting no one, and she knew a kind of loneliness that was like being battered with stones day and night. But by trusting, she learned there were different kinds of pain than just loneliness and hunger—misunderstandings, rejections, the tiny stinging social pains.

__

Those pains couldn’t usually touch her spiritual understanding with Ben. Usually, they had a perfect understanding.

__

She wished she dared to just sit in his lap and declare her feelings, to put an end to all of this. But who knew how he'd react in this strange mood of his, the mood that was slowly becoming the new norm.

__

 

__

—

__

 

__

It only took a day for her to hobble around the ship, but it took her three to get dressed and walk painstakingly down the long corridor to pilot the Falcon out of their dead stall.

__

The battle she was injured in had taken place in space, and according to Ben, the Resistance had regrouped at the core bases. Ben's first instinct had been to escape with only her on the Falcon, leaving the rest behind to fend for themselves. But apparently after Ben had killed Hux, the First Order was scattered.

__

The Resistance base was on a jungle planet, hidden from detection from orbit by the tall cover of the trees. Rey felt proud that she was able to walk by herself down the Falcon's docking ramp, Ben only shadowing her unsteady steps.

__

It was only when she saw Finn waiting, safe and sound and none the worse for wear, that she felt a fear in her chest dissolve away.

__

“You're looking better than I thought you would with this guy's messages,” Finn said, pleased and immediately giving her a comforting, ginger hug. “How are you feeling?”

__

“Still sore. But I've had worse falling in piles of scrap.”

__

“You were stabbed, remember? That's not clumsiness, Rey.” 

__

“It is if you're a Force user.”

__

Finn laughed. She embraced him back, feeling the life in him.

__

At least Finn was acting normally, the way he should be acting. It was enormously comforting.

__

“Don't be so hard on yourself, you hear me? You might have gotten hurt, but the First Order just had its head chopped off. There's nothing to fight for now, so you can just get better. Relax for once.”

__

It sounded so outlandish to her that she laughed in his ear. “I don't know what relaxing is." 

__

"Me neither, but we're pretty smart. We'll figure it out," he said.

__

When she finally let Finn return to his duties, Ben was frowning at them, arms crossed.

__

“Well, I have my orders from General Finn,” she said.

__

Ben grunted noncommittally and watched the way she moved. “Are you tired?”

__

"A bit, but it's still better than being stuck in bed." 

__

_ Unless it was stuck in bed with you, _ she added.  _ That wouldn't be so bad. _

__

When Rey moved close and raised her hand to touch him, Ben stiffened and stepped away from her, but then relented, offering his arm. 

__

It was a slight rejection, but it struck her deeply. 

__

“What?” she demanded.

__

“It's nothing,” he said, face hard.

__

Rey suddenly decided she would rather walk on metal shards than take his arm. She stiffened and proudly walked through the base on her own two feet. Ben trailed behind her.

__

What was so wrong with her that he would flinch? She usually didn't care much if she made social mistakes; the little rules people lived by were arbitrary and impractical. But sometimes she still got the feeling there was something wrong with her, like finding out people were staring at her only after weeks of stuffing her face in front of them. There were things she just didn't know.

__

It was usually easy with Ben because his mind was open and honest with her. He was always honest with her, even when it hurt more than anything.

__

_ But not anymore, _ she thought with a pang.  _ He said things would change. _

__

Maybe she was broken without knowing it. Like one of those creatures who couldn't find a mate because there was something off about them, the ones thrown from the nest by their parents—their feathers were the wrong color, or their call was too screechy.

__

Rey shook her head, getting angrier. Well, Ben wasn't married to anyone else yet. He hadn't been looking at other plumage. She'd just have to prove her strength. There had to be a way.

__

“If you're feeling well enough to walk so far, you're strong enough to work,” Ben observed behind her.

__

This was a truth in her life, so she nodded. There was no time for illness or injury on Jakku, and though his care and his food had started to heal something hidden in her, it wasn't strictly necessary for survival. She preferred being busy, anyway.

__

 

__

—

__

 

__

Ben took her on the familiar hike to their training hall, the wide isolated building that the two of them had built together. Built from great wooden beams they had cleared from the forest, there was a hill of earth piled on top, with saplings and grass growing to conceal it from orbit. 

__

Being buried under earth made the largest room dark, cool and quiet like a comfortable cave. One entire wall was made of a sheet of transparisteel that looked out on the untouched forest, where they usually sat in paired meditation. Another two walls were covered in mirrors for them to critique their stances when they crossed lightsabers.

__

The Resistance called it the Temple. Rey wasn't sure what to call it, and the name made Ben uncomfortable. But it was a place for them to be, a sanctuary and a place of healing. It was a place they had made together, and Rey loved it as she'd never loved a home before.

__

“Are you strong enough to spar?” Ben asked the moment they stepped inside.

__

Rey had been thinking of sitting in meditation, to rest and feel the familiar trees first, but she nodded.

__

“You're getting stronger every day,” Ben said, throwing a wooden sword to her from a rack on the wall. “But you're not at your old strength yet.”

__

Rey remembered that was one of his strange demands before he'd let his bizarre anger go.

__

“Will you take your walls down now?” she asked. “Being here and not being able to feel you is… it's bad. I don't like it.”

__

A flash of grief passed over his face before he turned away to look at the tranquil forest. “Not yet. When you're healed.”

__

Her newly distant partner trained obsessively with her, but all the time he grew even more distant. He was always frowning and he spoke less every day. It was like those old, hard days right after he joined the Resistance.

__

Rey was going to tear her hair out.

__

Every night he would take her back to the Falcon. It was as if he felt the most secure there, the place he'd instinctively escaped to with her wounded in his arms. He continued to feed her meals he made with his hands from his mother's kitchen, not trusting the rations to be good enough to make her healthy again. Each time she ate his food, she felt that hidden part of her knit together a little more.

__

But as she regained strength, he became more gloomy and somber. Sometimes he would stare at her with all the tragedy of the galaxy, like he'd lost everything and he'd never be happy again.

__

She couldn't bear it. Rey would have given everything she had to pry his thoughts out if his mouth, but he wouldn't let her.

__

As soon as she woke every morning, he led her to their training room and handed her sword or staff. There, he worked her hard and without remorse, hardly giving her a chance to catch her breath.

__

That wasn't the way she wanted to be worked, frankly. After weeks of this, Rey could think of different physical activities she'd prefer. Secure in his annoying rock-hard mental defenses, Rey thought about her sad, hot tormentor as they fought.

__

_Hold me down against the floor. Kiss my neck and give me your cock. Let me take all of it, and everything else._

__

Rey bit her lip.

__

“Rey,” Ben said, face flushed with exertion and frowning. “Focus.”

__

Rey firmed up her stance, but bit her lip again, her eyes wandering over him. “I am focused.”

__

_I just want you to fuck me, looking at me just like that, with those eyes. Please, I need it._

__

He stared at her, eyes lidded and breathing hard. Then he struck at her with his staff as quick as a snake in an overhead strike, and she missed her side-step and her staff's angle was all wrong, and she had to meet it without any grace.

__

He almost hit her fingers. They both froze, absorbing the near-miss.

__

Ben threw his staff clattering to the ground.

__

“We're done for today,” he snapped. “I almost gave you a concussion because you won't concentrate.”

__

When his anger was aimed at her, it always startled her—which made her angry.

__

“That wouldn't have come close to happening if you weren't blocked off from me in the Force!”

__

“That's not it and you know it,” he said, grabbing her staff and yanking her toward him by her grip on it. “You're not taking this seriously. You're busy thinking about—”

__

He stopped mid-sentence, but it was too late.

__

The room began buzzing. She couldn't breathe.

__

“I… you…?” she whispered.

__

“I can hear you, still,” he said softly, guilt clear on his face. “It only keeps my thoughts from getting out. I can still hear the things you've been thinking.”

__

Rey dropped the staff and stumbled backward, blindly turning for the door outside.

__

“Rey, stop!”

__

The door wouldn't open under her hand. He had frozen it with the Force.

__

His hand was raised and he looked at her desperately. “Don't go,” he panted. “Please, don't go. Listen.”

__

Rey's humiliation began to be consumed by her rage. “Either let me go or take your wall down!”

__

A moment passed, and then he nodded.

__

He took it down.

__

And for the first time since she was stabbed, she could finally see.

__

“You're leaving me,” she said, numb.

__

She could see it. He planned to wait until she regained her strength, and then he would leave her here on this planet. She caught a mental picture of Ben traveling, heartsick and alone, far away from her.

__

Rey was numb all over, and still dizzy with that terrible threat of being abandoned. He heard everything she thought, he knew all her feelings and everything she wanted from him, and she still wasn't enough.

__

“No,” he said and then paused. “Well, yes. I am leaving, but not because of that.”

__

“Why?” she yelled, snatching up his staff. “Tell me why!”

__

He caught her weak strike with his palm. His eyes were calm and dark in their shaded sanctuary, the one they built together. “I can't watch you die for me. I love you, Rey.”

__

She could feel it. His mind was clear to her, and she could bask in the sun of his emotions again, finally. Rey had almost forgotten how strongly he felt things, rich as sunlight.

__

He loved her. He let her feel it, the depthless ocean of it. And her heart rang, rang, rang with the sound of bells.

__

Rey dropped the staff and clutched his hands, which still held the other staff between them. Finally, she could tell him, teary-eyed and open. “I love you,” she said.

__

Ben closed his eyes, pained.

__

“It's alright,” she tried, nudging his hands. “We're allowed to love each other. I've loved you since—”

__

Since longer than she wanted to admit. Since she saw his dark eyes limned by firelight, his hand stretched out.

__

There was that expression again, the one like he was mourning the galaxy, but really he was mourning her. “I can't let this happen. This made you step into that dagger.”

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Rey frowned, trying to follow his thoughts, his feelings thick in the room.

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“You wouldn't have done that if I wasn't there. You almost died in my arms. I could feel you… slipping.” His voice broke. “Slipping away from me in the Force. You were bleeding, and I couldn't….”

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Rey raised her hands to cup his face instinctively. He shuddered into her hands, and then dropped the staff to grab her waist, clutching her.

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It was fear, she realized. He wasn't angry at her. He was full of fear.

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“You will not die because of me,” Ben murmured fiercely. “I'd make you hate me before I'd let you.”

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“I couldn't hate you,” she said.

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“I've lost everyone, Rey. My family, they've all died because of me, for me, to try to help me. Every one. And it's all my fault. If you died like that, too—” He cut himself off, overcome, his mouth working. “I'm not worth you. Nothing is worth you. Don't ever think of making such a bad trade again. I won't give you the chance.”

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“I'm the one who's been making trades all my life, so I think I know how to recognize a good one,” Rey said, musing.

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His face darkened with that isolating determination. “Then I can't stay here.”

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“You can't escape,” Rey said, knowing it was true.

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He loved her, so it was already too late.

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She grasped his arm, turned, and flipped him forward to fall flat on his back on the padded floor. As he blinked on the floor, dazed, Rey straddled his wide frame, stretching as much as she could to pin his arms above his head.

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“What are you doing?” he wheezed, and for the first time in days, he sounded like his normal self.

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“I'm settling a dispute with the man I love.”

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Ben softened at that. He gazed at her mouth until she felt her blood pound. “Is this how disputes are settled?”

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“On Jakku it is,” she replied. “If you can pin me, I'll give in to you. If you can't, you have to give in to me.”

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Ben tested her grip on his arms and thighs. “I outweigh you. I'm stronger.”

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“I'll use the Force.”

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He frowned. “We're equals in the Force, so I'll still win.”

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“Don't be so sure.”

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“This isn't a game, Rey,” he said, eyes hard. “I have to leave.”

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Rey tightened her grip, baring her teeth. “Then you'd better hope you can pin me.”

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Losing patience, Ben flexed, pushing against her hands and thighs. He was enormous and taller than her, and he really was stronger physically. The inexorable, slow rise of his arms under her was almost terrifying—she couldn't stop it or even slow it down. He could simply lift her whole body weight, even at the extremes of his limbs.

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Quickly, she brought the Force to bear, which stopped him for the moment. Rey used those few seconds to renew her grip, grunting with the effort.

__

He was her equal in the Force. And he let her know it when he started to tap into it as well. It was easy, but then it was like trying to stop a mountain. But she still stopped it, and they hung in the balance.

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She held fast, dreading what he would do if he won. If he really would make her watch him fly away from her to keep her safe, whatever that meant.

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“You're afraid,” Rey said, gritting her teeth with the effort of holding him.

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“I endanger you.”

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“You take care of me.”

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His arms were rising again, slowly, his tendons taut and his muscles working. Feeling desperate to stop him, she lowered her head to his chest, her eyes pricking with tears.

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“Please don't do this. Don't be like my parents,” she begged him.

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His arms struck the floor again, muscles going limp. When she glanced up, he was staring at her with a stricken expression. “It’s not like that,” he said. “I'm just trying to do something right for once.”

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He strained again, sitting all the way up this time, almost knocking her off. She could see his protective instinct and fear fight with his desire to give in to her, to take her in his arms.

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So she pulled the one sabacc card she'd kept up her sleeve and sat back, letting his arms go and rhythmically grinding her pelvis down into his.

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“Rey,” he gasped, sitting back in shock. He stared between their bodies. “That's….”

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It was good. More than good. She meant to distract him, but it worked on her as well. They both became fixated immediately, forgetting to struggle with each other.

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Ben circled her waist with his hands and helped her, moving her according to his will, and she was lost in the sensation of how good he felt, the two of them so close. Rey closed her eyes, crying out in little tight breaths that she couldn’t help. It was exactly what she wanted, what she dreamed about—

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And then Ben roughly flipped her onto her back. The air puffed out of her lungs on impact, and before Rey could react, he had wrestled both of her wrists into one of his and almost pinned her thighs with his.

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“No!” Rey growled, both from the arrested sensation and the reversed positions. She strained her body like a bow, refusing to let him trap her legs.

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“I've spent the past few weeks with you thinking about nothing but having sex with me,” he said through gritted teeth, “and I've resisted the temptation to keep you safe. That strategy would work better against you.”

__

And then Rey gasped as he inundated her with the polished ideas he'd kept for weeks behind his wall—throwing her tray to the floor and just ruining her on the captain's bed, letting her have her eager fill of his cock. The image of tying her down and putting his mouth between her legs, teasing her for hours without letting her come.

__

When Rey dazedly came back to herself, she was thoroughly pinned beneath him, pressed close as he rose above her.

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“I win,” he said, unhappy. “Now give in to me.”

__

They were both breathing hard. His feelings were electric between them, and it felt the way great sandstorms darkened the sky and barrelled down.

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“I wouldn't mind giving in to you if we both wanted the same thing,” she whispered in his ear, then kissed his neck. “I love you.”

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He hissed in a breath as she pulled away, yearning etched on his face. “I can't.”

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“Why not?”

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He panted through his teeth, his hair everywhere, searching for an escape.

__

And then it finally came spilling out of him, the real, toxic pain: “I’m a monster.”

__

Rey’s heart twisted in her chest. “No, you're mine.”

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He shook his head. “I want what I don't deserve. I destroy everything. I'm going to hurt you.”

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“I trust you.”

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Ben stared at her, frustrated and vulnerable. “It hurts,” he whispered.

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“I know it does. I feel it. Lean into the fear.”

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Letting out a breath, he closed his eyes. And he was quiet for a time, lost in his own head.

__

He thrust against her absently, just a brush of his hardness into her soft belly. He was hard; she could feel him waiting, pressing against her. Just training with him had her wet and ready, let alone wrestling and being held by him, so she couldn’t make her breathing slow down.

__

Rey tried to meditate, too, but his sheer size and his closeness were doing too many things to her. So she just waited and looked at him—her tormented love with his mussed hair and full mouth.

__

When he opened his eyes, his storm in the Force had taken on a goal other than destruction, and the rhythm of his cock against her had become deliberate. His face was marveling as if seeing her clearly for the first time since she was injured.

__

“I’m sorry,” he said quietly. “I shouldn’t have made you wait.”

__

Ben lowered his head and kissed her. She could feel his heart, an egg in his chest, threatening to break from the sweet pressure, just like her own. He slanted his mouth and she tasted him, finally tasted him, felt his tongue tease her lips apart to touch her own. Once, twice, just the barest hints, but each one made her feel drugged, like she would do anything just to have more of it, that feeling—

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He suddenly started pulling her trousers and underclothes down her legs with impatient, demanding jerks. Then he did the same with her other clothes until she was completely naked.

__

Rey, still pinned by her wrists in one of his hands, deepened their kiss hungrily, in turns kicking her legs impatiently to help him and grinding up into him. It wasn’t enough, she needed—

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“Is this what you wanted?” he growled quietly, cupping her mound lightly with his hand.

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She tensed, then flung her head back into the floor, letting out a low whine.

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“It is, isn’t it?” he asked, tracing the wet seam of her with trembling fingers. “You’ve been thinking of this, of showing this to me.”

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“Yes,” she keened, canting into his hand.

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His hand left her—she cried out, forlorn—touched her thighs, and then he pushed her trapped arms more firmly into the floor above her head. “Stay just like this,” he told her, breathing hard. “Let me see you.”

__

He leaned back, staring at her, eyes fixated on her heaving chest to between her spread thighs. Her arms above her head were a vulnerability, but her legs only shook a little and she spread them wider, wanting him to see.

__

“Rey.” He looked overwhelmed, kissing the inside of her knee hotly, stroking her thighs. Then he touched her core with his fingers again, brushing the outside of her lips slowly. “You’re so… perfect. You’re beautiful.”

__

Rey turned her head away in denial, the praise catching her off-guard, uncomfortable in the cocoon of his words.

__

“I’m not… I’m—” Her head thrashed to the other side, words escaping her. Perfect? No, she tried so hard to hide it, but the truth was she was discardable, wasn’t she? Worth less than drink. Waiting for nothing, all alone…

__

His fingers were—

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They were right there, rubbing her soothingly, and his eyes were full of sad indignation for her. “You are, Rey.” He leaned over to kiss her, his lips demanding and worshipful.

__

As she kissed him, it was as if she was in a rainstorm getting wet, but the rain was his awe of her, his feelings of reverence falling around her and seeping into her. He didn’t stop kissing her for a long time—not until her own pitifully offered images (a girl left behind, a starving girl, a girl who could never love or be loved) were drowned in the deluge of his feelings.

__

And then it was just Ben’s feelings filling her, the miracle of finally finding her after years of darkness and pain, how he would suffer through those years all over again just to meet her, how she made it all worth it.

__

She was more than a girl in his eyes.

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“Don’t move,” he breathed, triumphant, wiping her tearing eyes. “Let me take care of you.”

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And then he put his face between her legs, just breathing her in for a breathless moment before he put his mouth on her, his tongue.

__

“Oh,” Rey said and Ben hummed into her in answer, tasting her, exploring, his eyes locked onto hers. He was a man on a mission, determined to do well.

__

When he found her clit and her whole body jerked, he hummed again in pure happiness and massaged it with just the right amount of pressure with his tongue, and she couldn’t stop trembling, her hands were in his hair and he knew just what she wanted most, he could read it in her soul—

__

And then he pressed her again, curled his tongue just so, and the tension curling her spine released her soul was leaving her own body as her vision went white and she ground against his face.

__

“You’re so good. You taste so good,” he praised her, panting like he’d been running. His mouth was wet.

__

“Ben,” she gasped, needy and throbbing with the instinct to press him close to her. He answered her thought, crawling up to take her into his arms, tucking his face into her neck. Rey wrapped around him, knees hitched around his wide hips and clutching him to her.

__

She whined in her throat at finding clothes beneath her hands and not the bare skin she wanted. He let her pry at his clothes for a moment, as if enjoying the novelty—and then he obliged her, hastily stripping with practiced ease. He somehow managed to look bigger without clothes, like they were only holding him back. Ben loomed over her.

__

Their first embrace without clothes was like an electric shock, and her instincts led her to cling her legs around his waist again, hands greedily feeling his chest, his back. Their genitals pressed together and as she cried out, Ben cursed into her mouth, thrusting against her soaked clit.

__

“Ben, please, I need—” she begged, and he tore away from her mouth to press his cock against her entrance.

__

He pressed inside, opening her and filling her until she couldn’t think of anything else but the feeling of him finally inside her. He stopped when his hips met hers and pressed forward even more.

__

Ben looked dumbfounded. “You feel so good.”

__

She smiled and clenched her inner muscles around him. He cried out, beginning to thrust.

__

He fell into a kiss as they moved, starving for her. “You wanted my cock,” he said. “Look how you're taking it.”

__

She lifted her head. He was mesmerized, looking down between them. Watching the way he disappeared inside her with every flex of his hips.

__

“You really want me,” he said as if it were a revelation to him and not an obvious fact. “You want me inside you. You're just drawing me in.”

__

“Yes,” she said, biting her lip.

__

“I heard what you wanted this whole time,” he said, face open. “You just wanted to be held down and fucked.”

__

“You were driving me crazy,” she said.

__

“I know,” he soothed and angled his next stroke a different direction.

__

“Yes,” she chanted, completely out of control, only braced by his body, close to the edge. “Yes, yes—!”

__

He gave a low groan and stopped abruptly, hilted deep within her. She cried out in protest and instinctively wrapped her thighs around him to continue the movement, but he grappled her down again, his arms under her knees and his hands circling her wrists until she couldn't move at all.

__

“I want you to say it,” he leaned forward to murmur in her ear. “Say who's inside you.”

__

“You are.” She made a helpless, needy noise, desperate and still writhing. “Ben, please!”

__

“What do you want me to do?” he asked, implacable as stone.

__

“I want you to fuck me, please, I want you. I want you—”

__

“You want to come,” he murmured, “but I won't let you. Not unless you kiss me. Kiss me, Rey.”

__

He lowered his face near hers, and she gave him a sweet, close-mouthed kiss.

__

“I love you, Rey.” His voice was scraped raw, exposed and simple. He kissed her desperately, finally moving inside her again, hard and deep and thick, like he could leave an indelible mark on her by the way he fucked her.

__

She could hear the sounds she was making as she ratcheted up to the brink again, her pleas loud in her own ears. “Please—”

__

He left her, slipping out of her, but before she could get a breath to scream in protest, he grabbed her by the waist and flipped her onto her stomach. He lifted her to her knees and held her wrists together behind her back, then held her hair with his other hand and used that grip to hold her face down against the mat.

__

Experimentally, she flexed against his hold, searching for weakness as he pushed her knees apart. But his hand around her wrist was like a manacle, and her legs were spread, and then he pushed into her from behind and she forgot everything.

__

He was so deep.

__

She was helpless and frustrated, answering to his body's every whim. But so cherished, so taken care of, out of her own body and in another world where the only thing that mattered was his weight, his cock, the perfect angle—

__

It was too new and perfect and he couldn’t last. They both couldn’t. She came first, shuddering, and this time he was inside her. Clenching down over and over on his cock made it so much more intense. She felt him come, pressing insistently into her and filling her, his hand pressing down on her upper back. The sense of his pleasure sent her higher, and they fed back into each other in a loop that had no end.

__

He fell half on top of her, curling into her and holding her, kissing her shoulder in gratitude.

__

She noticed his expression darken.

__

“Don't be afraid,” Rey said, stroking his cheek.

__

“I don't want to lose you,” he said, looking out at the trees and the sun-dappled grass.

__

“You will eventually. One of us will die and leave the other behind. And that's not something we can change.”

__

She examined this pain from all sides, every pang and sting and deep ache of it. She could feel him doing the same in his mind. Feeling through the inevitable pain, that final pain.

__

He gripped her tighter in his arms, that thought almost too much for him.

__

“But we'll meet again,” Rey told him softly. “Someday. We should know that better than anyone else.”

__

The trees were listening, their roots delving deep. A high breeze touched the ringing treetops and swept down to tug the grass. The earth was solid beneath, and the stars in the heavens had their place.

__


End file.
